Once upon a time and not so long ago, blogs looked like blogs and websites looked like websites. You could easily tell the difference.
Then the WordPress CMS came along and changed everything. Now, it’s becoming increasingly harder to tell blogs and websites apart. Not so much in terms of what the sites are being used for, but in terms of web design and also being able to tell what’s “under the hood”.
(Can You Tell Which Application A Website Has Been Built With?)
For many website owners, understanding the difference between a Content Management System application like WordPress and other website-building tools is huge, not so much in terms of the technical differences, but more importantly, regarding the areas that the majority of website owners are concerned with, like web development costs, ease of use, ability to keep the website up-to-date, managing content, etc.
Think about this …
Which of the following options would you choose?
A) An eye-catching, professional-looking website that is actually expensive to build, or
B) The same eye-catching, professional-looking site, but at a cost that is significantly less than the cost of getting site “A” above.
If you picked option ”B” above, then you need to learn more about WordPress, why WordPress can be used to create an eye-catching website that will usually end up costing you far less to build than websites which use other web editor tools … and how to tell these two types apart!
WordPress is the world’s most popular online publishing platform and content management system (CMS). It is a flexible and powerful content management software that is ideally suited for most business needs.
Whether your reason for having an online presence is for personal blogging or business use, WordPress is easy enough for a novice with no web design skills to use, and offers an array of helpful functions that make your website extremely effective in terms of getting your content published, promoting visitor interaction, generating business leads and sales, scalability, etc.
With almost one in every five websites around the world currently being powered by WordPress, chances are that if you already own a website, your site is also driven by the WP CMS.
And if you don’t have a website yet, or are thinking of getting a website built, then wouldn’t it be great to be able to show your web developer an existing site with the design and layout that you like, know that it was built with WordPress and that you can, therefore, get a similar site built to a smaller budget if required?
How To Tell If Your Website Is A WP Web Site
Do you need to know if your website is powered by WordPress? Maybe you’ve come to this page because you’ve read about all of the great advantages of using WordPress, and you’re now wondering if your site was built using WordPress, or some other CMS application.
Also, have you ever looked at a competitor’s website and wondered what they’re doing to try and get better results online?
Knowing if your competitor’s site is built with WordPress can tell you a few things about their strategies and methods, such as what themes or plugins they are using.
Here are some simple methods you can use to quickly tell if sites are running on WordPress:
Search Your Source Code For The WordPress Footprint
If you know how to view the source code of a web page (e.g. Firefox Menu > Web Developer > Page Source if using Firefox, or Google Menu > More Tools > View Source if using Google Chrome), you can look for an obvious tell-tale footprint …
(Viewing the page source code using Firefox)
Let’s say that you are browsing online and you visit a website that you like, and you wonder if the site runs on WordPress …
First, bring up the site’s source code on your screen, using the methods described above.
Once the source code of the site loads on your screen, you can search for “wp-content” either by visually scanning the code …
Or use the browser’s “Find” function …
(Use Firefox’s ‘Find’ function)
This will tell you if the site was built with WordPress or not.
Note: If you are unable to see “wp-content” within the source code, it doesn’t mean that the site you’re looking at is not a WordPress site.
There are other ways to find out if a site was built using WordPress, as we will soon discuss.
As the focus of this article is to help non-technical users, however, we have listed below a number of easy methods you can use to check if your website is powered by WordPress other than scanning the source code.
Just Ask Your Webmaster
While this may seem like the most logical thing to do, a number of website developers, for whatever reason, may build their clients a website and not tell them it’s WordPress.
If you have an existing website and you’re not sure what CMS application is driving it, just ask your webmaster or whoever built your website if your website runs on WordPress.
That was easy, huh?
Okay … what if you can’t get in touch with the person who looks after your website, or what if you’ve come across a site that you really like while surfing online and you would like to know if it was built using WordPress?
Check Below The Footer
If the site uses a WP theme where the them template has not been modified, you can often see a “Proudly powered by WordPress” message shown at the bottom of the site …
(Powered by WordPress)
If these simple methods aren’t helpful to you, here are some other ways of identifying WordPress sites …
Tools That Tell You If A Website Uses WordPress
Here are a couple of sites that can tell you if a particular website uses WordPress or not, and what themes or plugins the site uses …
Is It WordPress?
(Is It WordPress?)
Is It WP? is a free tool that lets you easily check if a site uses WordPress or not.
Using this site is really quite easy. Just enter the address of the website into the search field and click the button next to it.
The tool will then go and search through the page code on the URL and tell you if the site was built using WordPress, and if so, it will even tell you the version of WordPress it is currently using …
If the site is not powered by WordPress, you will see a message similar to the one below …
To use this tool, go here:
Advanced WP Theme Checker by Satori
(WordPress Theme Detector)
WordPress Theme Detector by Satori Studio is a free tool that can help determine whether or not a website uses WordPress as its CMS engine; it will also tell you which theme the site is using and provide a link to the theme’s official page.
To use this tool, paste the URL of a web page (it doesn’t have to be the home page) into the ‘Enter website URL’ field and click on the ‘What WordPress theme is that?’ button …
(Enter website URL and click the button)
The Detector will automatically scan the website and output its theme information …
(WordPress Theme Detector displays theme results)
If a website is built with WordPress but the theme is too customized to contain any traces of its origins, the Detector will still let you know it’s a WP site by outputting a message on the right.
(Modified WordPress theme message)
If the website is not using WordPress at all, the tool will also let you know …
(This website is not WordPress)
You can try the Detector yourself by visiting this link:
Wappalyzer – Add-On For Firefox & Chrome Web Browser
(Wappalyzer – Browser Add-On (Firefox / Chrome))
If you use a web browser like Firefox or Chrome and would like to be able to tell if the sites that you are visiting are powered by WordPress, then Wappalyzer is a great extension for your web browser.
Wappalyzer tells you what type of software is installed on the sites while you are browsing.
According to their website …
“Wappalyzer is a browser extension that uncovers the technologies used on websites. It detects content management systems, eCommerce platforms, web servers, JavaScript frameworks, analytics tools and many more.”
Wappalyzer is also a very easy web browser add-on to install.
Once you have installed Wappalyzer on your web browser, icons will appear in your web browser identifying which software is installed on all the sites you are visiting …
If you see the WordPress icon displayed on the browser menu (as the above screen shot shows), then the site uses WordPress.
(This is a WordPress site!)
Go here to learn more about the Wappalyzer add-on:
SpyBar
(SpyBar – Browser Addon For WordPress)
SpyBar is a browser addon that lets you ‘reverse engineer’ any WordPress site you visit and see which WordPress plugins and themes are being used, right inside your web browser …
(SpyBar – Discover WordPress Plugins And Themes Used By Your Competitors)
SpyBar can be installed as a browser extension on Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox and is compatible with PC and Mac.
To download or learn more about SpyBar, go here:
Plugin Sniper
(Plugin Sniper – Find out what plugins a WordPress site is using)
Plugin Sniper lets you find out what plugins a WordPress site is using. This is a useful tool if you want to know what WordPress plugins are being used by your competitors.
Plugin Sniper is also a useful tool for researching what kinds of plugins businesses in certain niches are using …
(Search WordPress sites by categories and location)
To download or learn more about Plugin Sniper, go here:
We hope that you have found this tutorial useful.
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"I am beyond impressed with what you have put together. I can tell that you put a ton of hard work into building what you have. You have the absolute best content on WordPress I have ever seen!" - Robert T. Jillie